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Book Explores Politics of Evangelical Christians

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A new book edited by Dr. David Ryden of the Hope College political science faculty
looks beyond the voting record and stereotypes in seeking to understand the policy
views of evangelical Christians, a group whose rise he considers the most significant
occurrence at the intersection of politics and religion in the past three decades.

The volume, "Is the Good Book Good Enough? Evangelical Perspectives on Public Policy,"
collects analyses by 13 scholars regarding evangelical approaches to topics ranging
from environmentalism, immigration and criminal justice, to the war in Afghanistan,
same-sex marriage and racial reconciliation. It was published in January by Lexington
Books of Lanham, Md.

"The emergence of evangelicals in politics is the biggest development in terms of
religious influences on politics in the last 30 years, if not more," said Ryden, who
is a professor of political science. "You're looking at a group that represents anywhere
from a quarter to a third of the voting population."

While he noted that evangelicals' voting tendencies have been closely scrutinized,
the thinking that informs their policy views has not. He said that evangelicals are
more inclined than any other religious tradition to see their faith as impacting their
politics. At the same time, he finds they are often unfairly caricatured as simple-minded
and single-issue.

"One tends to see evangelicals portrayed as single-issue types, but that doesn't capture
a much more complex lay of the land," Ryden said. "Contemporary evangelicalism is
so much more than just this static approach to abortion or same-sex marriage. Rather,
their policy views are evolving on a whole range of domestic and foreign policy debates.
There's just a lot more going on."

"I was interested in providing a more nuanced portrait of evangelical policy perspectives,"
he said. "At the same time, I wanted to offer a serious critique of evangelical approaches
to public policy."

On environmental issues, for example, he said that evangelicals continue to be stereotyped
as resistant to concepts such as climate change or conservation. Yet, he said, there
are many serious evangelical scholars, to say nothing of lay evangelicals, who consider
environmental stewardship as a biblical calling. "There's been genuine movement,
and there's a good, healthy range of opinion," Ryden said.

Similarly, with respect to immigration, where he said that evangelicals are characterized
as "anti-immigrant, if not actually nativist," Ryden finds that thinking within evangelical
faith communities tells a different story. "Much has changed in the past few years,"
he said. "Indeed, evangelicals arguably find themselves uniquely positioned to balance
biblical values - the rule of law, justice, and care for the least among us."

While Ryden believes that evangelicals are misunderstood, he also feels that they
could be more effective in the policy realm by engaging the issues intellectually,
in addition to biblically. "Scriptural authority ought to be augmented by resort
to reason, science and other policy appeals, so that evangelicals aren't so easily
dismissed by people those don't share their theological views," he said.

Moreover, Ryden argues that evangelicals need to recognize that their biblically grounded
views ought not to place them automatically in one political camp or the other. He
believes that they also need to be aware that they are always in danger of being co-opted
for partisan political purposes.

"They need to be evangelical Christians first, and their partisan or ideological commitments
subordinate to scriptural authority," he said.

While Ryden has seen significant shifts in evangelical thinking on a host of issues
in recent years, he finds that the shifts haven't necessarily produced major changes
in voting patterns. In the most recent election cycles, he said, evangelicals remained
firmly in the Republican voting column. Yet he sees a new breed of evangelical leaders
who are less overtly partisan, and feels that younger evangelicals who don't necessarily
share their parents' cultural conservatism may be less inclined to affiliate with
the Republican party. He noted that while it's too early to foretell big shifts in
voting among evangelicals, the answer will matter a great deal.

"It's hard to make very firm predictions as to whether evangelicals will become less
reliably Republican as their policy attitudes change," he said. "But given their
importance to the Republican voting bloc, it's something that bears watching."

Related News

07 Feb

Book Explores Politics of Evangelical Christians

A new book edited by Dr. David Ryden of the Hope College political science faculty looks beyond the voting record and stereotypes in seeking to understand the policy views of evangelical Christians, a group whose rise he considers the most significant occurrence at the intersection of politics and religion in the past three decades.